Piraeus

China signed a huge deal on Wednesday to finance a high-speed bullet train between Budapest and Belgrade, a key link in Beijing’s expanding network for getting its goods to European markets.

“This will put in place a corridor between China and Europe,” Chinese Premier Li Keqiang told reporters after signing the deal in Belgrade, estimated by local media to be worth 1.5 billion euros.

Police on Tuesday arrested seven suspected members of an extortion racket believed to have targeted more than 20 nightclubs in Athens, Piraeus and western Attica, occasionally using violence.

The suspects, five Albanians and two Greeks, were detained on Tuesday following a series of police raids while another three suspected accomplices were being sought late last night.

An elderly woman died Tuesday after falling on the tracks at the Ano Patissia station of the Piraeus-Kifissia electric railway (ISAP).

The woman fell onto the tracks as a Piraeus-bound train was approaching at about 4.30 p.m., according to the police and fire service.

By Vangelis Mandravelis

Every week three or four Trainose trains, each consisting of 38 carriages, depart from Piraeus carrying as many containers of Sony merchandize destined for Slovakia, where the Japanese elctronics giant assembles TV sets to cover the needs of its European market.

By Ilias Bellos

The heads of state and government of 16 Central and Eastern European countries as well as Chinese Premier Li Keqiang are on their way to Belgrade for the summit meeting that takes place on Tuesday and Wednesday concerning the expansion of the region’s economic, commercial and investment cooperation with China.

The Omonia metro and Kifissia-Piraeus electric railway (ISAP) train stations were expected to close their doors to the public at 5.30 p.m. on Thursday following the announcement of a protest rally organized against "government violence" on Thursday afternoon.

A second wave of changes to bus services in Athens is due to be implemented on Monday, December 15.

Eight bus lines are to change routes: 704, 701, 747, 527, 501, 640, 444 and B8.

Also, the Piraeus-Acropolis-Syntagma express line introduced in May to help transport cruise passengers will stop.

It is set to start again in March.

Scientists exploring the 1st century BC Antikythera shipwreck off Greece’s southern coast will be unveiling findings from the first part of an international mission in Piraeus on Wednesday.

Piraeus Bank has shut down 70 branches in the last few weeks as a part of the group’s restructuring that has seen its network shrink from 1,350 branches in early 2013 to 800 today, or a reduction of 41 percent.

An AK-47 assault rifle that was cleared by forensic experts as being the gun used in an assault on a bar in the Piraeus neighborhood of Mikrolimano has been linked to three other attacks, including one which resulted in the death of a 43-year-old man in central Athens last month.